Eagles' speedy WR wins another race this weekend as U.S. Championships near originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
Devon Allen is quite literally racing toward training camp.
The Eagles’ speedy wide receiver and Olympic hurdler has been on a tear the last couple weeks. He has now won three 110-meter hurdle races since June 12.
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It began on June 12, when Allen posted a 12.84 in the 110-meter hurdles at the New York Grand Prix. That 12.84 was the the third-fastest time ever recorded in the event, missing the world record by 0.04 seconds. Now, he’s followed that up with two consecutive wins in the Diamond League.
Allen, 27, on Saturday in Paris posted a time of 13.16 to take first. That came just a couple days after posting a 13.22 to take first in Oslo on Thursday.
The next Diamond League race isn’t until June 30 in Stockholm but Allen will be back in the United States this week for the U.S. Championships at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon. The U.S. Championships run from June 23-26. The final event in the U.S. Championships is scheduled to be the men’s 110-meter hurdles final at 2:54 p.m. on Sunday, June 26.
The World Championships are also in Eugene on July 15-24. The Eagles begin to report to training camp on July 26.
Allen signed with the Eagles this offseason after an impressive workout at the Oregon pro day and a subsequent visit to the NovaCare Complex. He was a participant in the Eagles’ voluntary workout program but missed part of OTAs after testing positive for COVID-19. Once he was cleared to run, he nearly took down a world record.
Allen’s plan is to have a football career and a track career simultaneously. He wants to do both.
“Everybody is saying I’m quitting (track). I’m not quitting," Allen said in Paris last week, per WorldAthletics.com.
"During the football season I’m going to play football. And once February comes along and we’ve won the Super Bowl, hopefully I’m going to come back and start training for track and get ready for the major championships. When the athletics comes around, obviously I’ll need a little bit of leeway. Because it’s not quite the football season yet, there’s some training camps, but hopefully I’m doing well enough in football that I can do both.”
Allen hasn’t play football competitively since the 2016 season at Oregon — his best season came in 2014 — but said his plan was always to return to the sport. At Oregon, he caught 54 passes for 919 yards and 8 touchdowns and averaged 26.1 yards on kickoff returns in 23 games for the Ducks.
On a recent Takeoff with John Clark podcast, Allen explained the similarities between his training for the hurdles and for football.
“I train to be explosive and as strong as possible on the track,” Allen said. “And that’s pretty much what I’ll be doing in football.
“For the most part, I think my job is going to be to be the fast guy,” Allen said. “I’m one of the fastest men in the world so I need to be able to show that on the field. That’s something I’m hoping to do.”
While Allen’s chances of making the Eagles’ 53-man roster appear relatively slim given his long absence from the sport, he’s going to be an intriguing player to watch at training camp both as a receiver and as a returner. Heck, by that time he might be a world champion.
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